Midnight Wolverine: Indigiqueer Futures

Part 1 

“My queer identity is not a linear spectrum, it’s a whole spectrum. It allows movement, and there’s space within that circle to exist, and breathe, and shift.” 

Indigenous Queer performer and poet Midnight Wolverine guides us through Humber River, Yonge-Dundas Square, and Glad Day Bookshop to envision futures connected to the history of the land, ceremony, and queerness, in a city that sits in tension with their Indigeneity.  

Midnight Wolverine is Tkaronto's late night tease, trickster and shapeshifter. Originally from Treaty 8 territory in the Northwest Territories, they are a Dene/Métis Indigiqueer drag and burlesque performer, writer, artist, creator, and storyteller working to decolonize performance spaces, challenge common Indigenous and gender narratives, and create much needed two-spirit representation. They have politicized and sexified stages nationally, including the Fierce Queer International Burlesque Festival, Bagel Burlesque Expo Montreal, Asinabka Festival, Pride Toronto, and Pride Yukon. They have also been featured on CBC Gem’s Canada's A Drag Season 3 and CBC’s q with Tom Power. @midnight.wolverine 

Part 2 

Midnight Wolverine is joined by Indigenous architect Matthew Hickey. The conversation flows naturally between queerness and Indigeneity, as they go deeper into the role of Indigenous place-keeping for urban futures, carving pockets of belonging and the act of “building” into their practices, reconnecting with nature, and even co-designing their dream Indigiqueer space in the city.  

Matthew Hickey is Mohawk from the Six Nations of the Grand River Reserve. He has been practicing architecture at Two Row Architect for 14 years, and currently oversees design and development for the firm, which focuses on guiding the realignment of mainstream ways of thinking towards Indigenous ways of knowing and being in design and architecture. 

Matthew’s focus for sustainability is on regenerative and restorative design – encompassing ecological, cultural, and economic principles. His work pushes the concepts of Universal Inclusivity through integrated landscapes, food equity, the importance of water and place-keeping for all species, including humans. His research includes Indigenous history in architecture of Northern & Middle America, and the realignment of western ideology towards historic sustainable technologies for the contemporary North American climate.  

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:05

Ambient music and sound.

Hima Batavia: 0:12

Welcome to Desire Paths, presented by Luminato with Toronto based foresight studio From Later. I'm Hima Batavia, one of the curators of this audio experience. What are Desire Paths? They're unpaved passages slowly carved into the terrain of a city formed by the citizens own walking tracks, and guided by their belief in a better way. In this six-episode series, we'll explore possible futures of Toronto through the imaginations of local artists and urbanists. Each artist takes us on a field trip, one that weaves histories and futures into a vision of what this city could be. Today. We ride with Midnight Wolverine, an Indigenous drag King, burlesque performer, and poet. And we'll hear Midnight's conversation with Matthew Hickey of Two Row Architect on their journey in shaping Indigenous futures of Toronto. Consider putting on your shoes and going outside. Use this episode as a meditation to carve your own desire paths for this city in all its beauty, complexity and contradictions.

Midnight Wolverine: 1:42

My given name is Tunchai Redvers, which is Dene Sųłiné, and it means flower and spirit calls me[inaudible], which is white feather woman. But today I am here as Mx Wolverine, which is a name that honors another part of my spirit. Mx Wolverine is a drag King and I'm here at the Humber River and I'm going to lay some tobacco to introduce myself to the space and to these lands and to call in those great ancestors who walk with me. And who are here with me today and in laying this tobacco I'm giving thanks for these lands that I'm on, which is Tkaronto or dish with one spoon territory, which is the meeting place of the Haudenosaunee, Anishnabe, and the Huron Wendat peoples. And most recently is home to the Mississaugas of the New Credits. And so I've just laid my tobacco underneath the tree and just want to say marsi cho, chi miigwetch to the great spirit, to all of creation, for gifting us with this beautiful day and for allowing me this opportunity to be here at the Humber and to all of the other places that we have yet to visit. So marsi cho. This place is always my grounding place. I feel like when life gets chaotic and the city gets too much, I find myself here at the Humber river, it's kind of like a little Oasis or this place is solitude for me, that is almost always incredibly difficult to access in the city. And the Humber river is a really special place that I don't think a lot of Torontonians know about. I brought so many people here who have never visited the Humber before, um, and it's such a sacred site. And so as I stand here on the shore of the river, I feel the breeze, I feel the wind or what I like to call the calling of the ancestors and the spirits who are with us, who whisper their truth. If we're open to listening, I remember coming here and feeling the power of the land, the sacredness of the river, but also the amount of pain that this river and these lands carry because of everything that this land has had to endure. Walking along the river, there's people coming and going, and then you look up and you see all of these massive mansions lined up along the river, looking out over the river. And I remember thinking, wow, what it would be like to have that money, but also how ancient this land is and how I imagine that very few, if any of the people living in those big mansions know the history of this area and what was here before their houses were. I grew up in an area of kind of untouched land thriving and healthy. And I come here and I don't feel that health, so to speak. If it feels like the sense of suffocation, a little bit like the water, these trees, this area's kind of suffocated by everything else that's around it. And it's just trying to keep breathing. And so I have a fear that this area is just going to keep getting developed into, you know, more houses, more residential areas, or people are going to continue to not know and acknowledge and understand the history. And I fear that this land will never be the same again. In an ecosystem, everything has a purpose and everything is interconnected in some way, everything needs support to survive and to thrive. And I think of maybe queer ecosystems in a similar way that queer communities have come together and come together to support one another, to be authentic and to seek safety from, you know, everything surrounding or outside of that community. And so I think queer communities have yeah, carved out their own kind of little ecosystems that they need to survive and to thrive in otherwise threatening environment.

Ambient Sound: 6:57

The sound of rivers.

Midnight Wolverine: 7:01

I think that I'm always kind of on this journey of finding a balance within myself, but also in the spaces that I existed. I derive a lot of my confidence and sexual energy from the land it's getting in touch with that kind of innate primal part of you. That again is often silenced by so many things around us. And so I think there's a lot that land and natural elements can teach us including how to feel more comfortable and confident in our bodies and in our sexuality. Um, by walking in drag here, I am owning these innate parts of myself. I'm owning that masculine, feminine energy, which is in balance with everything that's around me. I am resisting colonial expectation and colonial destruction. And I am radiating a sense of pride in who I am, because I feel held by the water and the land underneath my feet. And I feel a sense of safety. In indigenous worldview, you have multiple parts of yourself. So you have the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. And most often the spiritual part of ourselves are unspoken or kind of left out. And so my hope is for spaces where people can feel better connected to, or reconnected to that spiritual self. And that's the feeling I always get when I come to the water and I think it would be really cool if city spaces could cultivate more of that.

Ambient Sound: 8:58

[inaudible]

Midnight Wolverine / Poem: 8:59

I walked the trails of ancestors past light beaming footprints, forgotten teachings, falling in the form of snow only to be stepped on by all those who seek something, something under sacred trees painted with memorialization of a past that has trouble breathing under the construction of a foreign future. I walk counting glances instead of steps, the sacred body like the trees is memorialized by fragments of being reaching out to be acknowledged, instead of remembered this queered and a body pulls from earth and sky shaped by everything in between and more, I hear the river laugh as people stare, we are one entity flowing and nonlinear life rushing over a rock. We are examples of ceremony in the face of destructive modernity.

Midnight Wolverine: 10:00

Yeah. So I'm sitting in the middle of Yonge and Dundas Square, and I cannot remember the last time I was here. There is an overstimulation of sounds and smells. And anytime I'm in this area, I feel like I'm on alert. I think the tension is feeling so in opposition to everything that Yonge and Dundas square stands for capitalism, the need for more, the need for things that may be don't matter as much as other things should. That's what I'm working in opposition of. And I feel much more uncomfortable being here in my blue mustache than I did when we were walking along the Humber river. I'm surrounded by massive billboards trying to sell me stuff, trying to tell me who I should be. Uh, so I was a part of a Nordstrom campaign and, uh, I was one of two Indigenous folks who were part of that campaign. And my face was on the biggest billboard in all of Toronto. And I remember coming here and seeing it for the first time and seeing myself up there and like it feeling so displaced kind of from who I am. But I also remember seeing that and thinking how revolutionary it is in a way to see my queer Indigenous face, multiple stories high. Um, and I remember that moment of just seeing myself and whenever I'm in Toronto, whenever I'm in downtown, there's this sense of invisibility that I feel like I feel, I feel insignificant to the world and I feel insignificant to the people around me. So we're walking down Yonge street and I do not see a single tree in sight. Um, just lots of concrete. And that's what doesn't feel like home. To me, it feels like there's never a stillness or a slowness in downtown Toronto. I'm trying to imagine what this place looked like before it looked like this. Like now I'm starting to see the first trees that we've seen in a number of blocks. And I wonder how many trees existed in this very space that we're walking on? Why aren't there more trees? Like why isn't that priority to have that actually be built in to the core of the city? Like, what would it look like to have more park spaces or gathering spaces, some sort of ceremonial lodge or like ceremonial house. And that really varies dependent on like the nation. Like I think of the Haudenosaunee like long houses or Anishnabe, um, like sweat lodges, or I think of ceremony. And I think there's, there's some way to bring in ceremonial structures into these like concrete, urban spaces. When I see a circle, I think of safety because held within that circle, I imagine people, I imagine a community kind of standing together or being there for each other. And it feels kind of like the circle of safety. The circle is also inconclusive, meaning that there's never a beginning and an end point, there's always movement and it's never in one direction. You know, it's, that's how I see my queerness. My queer identity is not a linear spectrum. It's a whole spectrum. It allows movement and theres space within that circle to exist and breathe and shift. And I would love to see more of the circle exist in infrastructure and buildings in public spaces. I think the goal should be to not have to fight, to be seen and held and valued and cared about. I think what would allow me to stay would be more green space, more Indigenous visibility. And there are so many different ways that that can look color, art, greenery, local faces, local businesses. I think there's a way to bring more of what I experienced standing at the Humber into these spaces. Then I would be more likely to come here more often. There needs to be real conversations happening around, you know, what is queerness beyond hanging pride flags? What is Indigeneity beyond sticking medicine wheels everywhere? And there's just so much more to it.

Midnight Wolverine / Poem: 15:16

How do we remember ourselves when we can not hear our own thoughts, feelings, dreams of connectivity to something bigger than buildings? How do we root ourselves in concrete or not even trees live street, horns, buzz, sign horns. There was only so tall. You can grow before you need support to lean. How do we build in, how do we move shift become when the end of a linear line is far too narrow for us all.

Midnight Wolverine: 15:50

So I am in Glad Day bookshop and I just walked in and you can hear people chatting and I'm seeing walls of queer literature and, uh, even a wall of Indigenous literature, which is amazing. There's a little pride Christmas tree. And, uh, anytime I walk into glad day bookshop, I just feel an immediate sense of comfort or at homeness because everyone here is always so friendly and welcoming. And, uh, I spend so much time here. I launched my first poetry book here at glad day, which is the place I wanted to have my book launch because for me it represented a space where both of my identities can exist, both my indigeneity and my queerness. And I remember being really surprised coming to glad day and seeing how much indigenous literature that they had. I debuted as MX Wolverine at pride, Toronto at Yonge and Dundas square in 2018. And I probably would have performed at glad day shortly after that. So probably would have been the summer of 2018. And it feels different than other performing spaces because it feels kind of like that living room vibe, as opposed to, you know, big stage or a stage space or a bar hang out. And how do you, how do you experience time here? It slows down. The first thing I heard when I walked in was laughter, which is really nice, but there's also a lot of energy here. Like when you come in for shows, there is so much energy there's kind of space to show up as you are and where you're at without it feeling overwhelming. Like this part of Toronto, which is the gay village is also very gay men centered. And there aren't a lot of spaces that are available and welcoming and inclusive of, you know, non binary and trans identities. And so glad day has been a home for queer folks who have been otherwise left out of queer spaces. There is like a sacredness to it, but also like a fragility. And when you can access that anywhere else, the stakes, I think become a lot higher in terms of, you know, wanting to ensure that the space stays sacred and safe in a way, but there's the responsibility to continue to hold that space or to want to make things better or continue to make the space safer and safer for folks. And I think that's what a lot of other spaces lack is like a willingness and a sense of responsibility to want a place, to feel inclusive and welcoming and safe. So there's that freedom to be who you are without having to explain it or justify it. You just are. And so my hope for future cities, towns everywhere is, is to be free to walk around looking like the way you want to look moving the way that you want to move, being the way that you want to be without the constant like scrutiny. Like why can't I walk down the street at three o'clock on a Wednesday in a full glitter beard. If I want to, without the constant gaze of people being like, what the heck is this person? I think that's that's the balance is, is still needing specific spaces, just like needing indigenous specific spaces, but having opportunities for people to learn more about identities, learn more about indigenous identities and feel like they can be a part of that in some way. So I think it's a mix of having those specific spaces, but also spaces where people can come together. I've always wanted to start up like a two-spirit specific kind of open mic or drag event just for the indigenous community. Um, because those spaces are so important. And so I think it would just look like, again, being more intentional and allowing people to co- organize with you or to hand over the reigns and let other people organize. I believe so fully in the importance of spaces specific to those people or those communities and things would look differently. If people were more willing to give up space in order to grade space for other people, it'll just take more time, more willingness, more responsibility, more action, More dialogue, but it can happen. We are hiding behind the shadows of doors that were not built for us to open. So we forged forward with each other on our backs, carving openings like pockets they didn't know existed. Expression is escape from survival. I want to bleed opportunity on these roads, not fear. I need to see truly see people who are me. I long for intention in the belly of a structure that can hold us with care. I wish to hold hands on either side of me. So I am not stuck in the cracks behind my utopia is to breathe, not just in one space, but a galaxy of spaces that believe we belong. I desire paths of community.

Matthew Hickey: 21:48

[inaudible] Matthew[inaudible]. My name is Matthew Hickey. I'm Mohawk Wolf clan from six nations. On the bill C31B. My mum is native Mohawk from six nations and my father was Irish. So I got my status back in 1985. I'm queer, I'm gay. I grew up in Hamilton and, uh, always interested in architecture. So I moved to Toronto in 1998, where I went to OCAD, Ontario college of art and design. And I did my undergrad there. And then I did my master's of architecture at the University of Calgary. I work for an architecture firm called Two Row Architect, which is the gateway into the two row. Wampum is in our name and we do work all over Ontario, all over Canada.

Midnight Wolverine: 22:31

What inspired you or what brought you to, to architecture? What was it that kind of like, I dunno, it seemed possible for you.

Matthew Hickey: 22:40

So it would be either my aunt or my grandmother that taught me how to draw a 3d building when I was like three or four years old. So I just started drawing 3d. And that really, that was a spark and I always wanted to be an architect. I'm not very good at math. So I had to go a different route into it. I went into OCAD as an arts and design college and I made my path and I found my way. So yeah, it's always been an interest of mine.

Midnight Wolverine: 23:05

What's it like being like an indigenous person in that world? Cause I, I know so little about the architecture world, but I imagine like so many of the other industries out there that it's predominantly like white centric and Western centric. So what's that been like?

Matthew Hickey: 23:20

Absolutely. Right. I mean, Douglas Cardinal, who's quite a famous indigenous architect was the first and he's right after they changed, the Indian act could pre 1961 when you couldn't get a degree or become a clergyman, you lost your status. Right. So it was right after that. And since him, I think I'm the 13th registered architect, indigenous architect in Canada. And so it's quite exciting. I work with, uh, Brian Porter, who's probably number six or seven. He's, uh, kind of mentored me and I've been working with him since I left school, uh, or he's Oneida from six nations. But, uh, it's really interesting, especially in these days we've, miduh, kind of all come together since 2016. So we're very close. I know most of the indigenous architects and, you know, can pick up the phone and call them, uh, we try and do work with them wherever we are across Canada. Uh, but about maybe I would say a handful of us are practicing architects and then the rest are in the academic world, which I mean, there's importance to both of those areas, but it's a very small group

Midnight Wolverine: 24:21

13! In all of Canada. That's wild.

Matthew Hickey: 24:23

Yeah. I mean, our numbers are growing, which is great. And I think that's just as a result of, you know, people seeing the profession or being more exposed, I think the internet and being on Facebook and all these things have really exposed communities that didn't have people that were leaving them, being architects. You know, there's lots of doctors, lawyers, those types of things, but being exposed to the profession, the design profession has really opened up over the past 10 years. I'd say the thing that I love about indigenous people and we're so creative, you have such a capacity to create in different ways

Midnight Wolverine: 24:56

In us. It's like in our blood and bones.

Matthew Hickey: 24:58

Exactly. And I see that being very valuable to architecture and to the design world, we're trying to expose more indigenous students in high school to, you know, what they can do when they leave high school into either design architecture, even art, because it's a path that we tend to not go down. I mean, it's not an easy path, either architecture school, but it's definitely rewarding at the end. I listened to your visit to the Humber river. And I think that's, I mean, this is something that I did a couple of years ago as well. We took a canoe trip from the mill down to the mouth of the Humber. And it was just kind of a transformation of where you are from being in the city proper to almost feeling like you're in a different world. It feels like your poetry is inspired by that kind of dichotomy between the city and, and these places where we can actually feel like ourselves. And I'm wondering if I could ask you a little bit about that?

Midnight Wolverine: 25:52

Being a young indigenous person who didn't come into my queer identity until I left home, because home wasn't a space that fostered queerness in any way, shape or form. I was always thinking beyond the borders of like the North and I was always a big thinker and a big dreamer. And so I always kind of felt this dichotomy of being from isolated sub-arctic North and feeling that like comfort and safety in the physical land and not necessarily the places and spaces that exist in the North, but specifically the land while also always wanting to escape to something else to something more, because I also didn't really feel like I fit where I was and that dichotomy has carried with me entering into urban environments because it was always so intimidating to me like loud, urban spaces, the energy just always felt different and I'm a Northern person at heart, but I also thrive on community and performance and art and opportunity. And so it's a constant thing that I'm still navigating, but I think that's also speaks to my queer and indigenous identity. And I don't know if you feel this as well, but sometimes it feels like those identities are in tention to each other. And I have a poem about it. And this poem is about, you know, being indigenous over queer or, you know, having these identities be separate things to me and coming to this realization that these identities are not separate. Like I am one whole person, these identities belong together.

Matthew Hickey: 27:32

Yeah. It's kind of funny because Toronto, in some ways is a safe place to be queer, but it's not really easy to be queer and indigenous here at the same time, you kind of have to go home to your home community to be indigenous. So there is that separation. Um, I mean, even for me, when I moved to Toronto, I wanted to come to Toronto to be gay, you know, to even come out from the city to city. So there's kind of that draw of that community that we're looking for, you know? And then how do you find a queer and indigenous community within Toronto? I mean, it seems like you've kind of got that a bit figured out, but I do think that there is that relationship to the land that we miss and, you know, being on the Humber is really a kind of one of the first times where I felt like I was actually in the city and you're not in the city. You're really connected to the water. You're connected to this historic trade route. You know, that's been used for thousands of years and you can feel that and kind of escape into your indigenous identity there.

Midnight Wolverine: 28:25

It's always this movement that we're having to do shifting between like spaces and putting forward different parts of ourselves. And so I think, especially with this piece, like the poetry piece, the site visits it's all about for me is like, how can we create spaces where indigeneity and queerness can exist together in a way that feels like whole and natural? How does your identity, ancestry and practice exist in relation to the land and urban space of Toronto?

Matthew Hickey: 28:57

When we start thinking about a project in the city, and this is something that comes from my identities, being an indigenous person, I always think about what was here before me. And how can we think about pulling back to that time or making reference to that and paying respect to that. We have this idea as humans that we're above everything else. And that's constantly repeated in our, in our way that we deal with urban environments specifically, we just pave over it or we dig it up or it's meant to be sold or bought. But if we start thinking about how we belong to the land, you know, and thinking about how, if that wasn't here, we wouldn't be here either that we kind of shift the way that we think about approaching a project so yeah, for me, it's really about tying back into your identity as a person in connection with the larger world. Do you feel the same way? Is that how you start your work?

Midnight Wolverine: 29:52

A lot of my work is grounded in concepts of the land. I published a poetry book back in 2019, it's called fireweed and fireweed is a flower that's native to the Northwest. And it's such a symbolic flower for me because when an area of land has been devastated by a forest fire and everything is burned to Ash. And the very first thing that will grow is the fireweed, which is considered the Phoenix of flowers, because it will literally grow from Ash. And once that fire weed flower grows, it will start to blow it seeds and signal to the rest of the natural world that it's time to regrow. And what's beautiful about fireweed is it never grows alone. If you see fireweed flower, it's often in kind of a community of fireweed flowers. And so I carry this like symbolism of the fireweed flower with me, and it's also kind of how I see my indigeneity and my queerness of kind of having, having risen from ash essentially, and, and like facilitated growth and any poetry or writing I do, or even performance work I do is often in connection to the land, whether it's like sights, smells, sounds, and this feeling of rootedness. So it always shows up in my life.

Matthew Hickey: 31:11

You think about, uh, Anishnabe teaching lodge and you all the, all the branches, the Maples is put in place with prayer and then it's bent and everything has a symbol or meaning to it. And the process of putting it together with your community is as important as the final structure is. You know, there's, it's not just about the form at the end. It's about how you get there. And I think that's something that's really important from an indigenous point of view. And I think that's kind of important in being gay or queer as well as, you know, our process of becoming comfortable with ourselves, that tension that we go through from the time when nobody knows, and we only know inside and then to telling one person to telling your family, to telling your mother, you know, and then you slowly, I think become more comfortable with yourself to a point in time where you don't think about it anymore. I don't, I don't even think about it anymore. I just am who I am.

Midnight Wolverine: 32:02

I think about when I'm building a performance, like when MX Wolverine or Midnight Wolverine is building their performance. And it's all about that intention right down to the makeup. I do the sequins that I put on my costume, do I put sequins on my costume, the music, um, the editing of the music, everything is curated and it's intentional because I'm telling a story and I'm, I'm constructing something out of all of these different parts to build something whole. And that feels like a very like ceremonial process for me actually, because you think back to know the construction of a sweat lodge, like you said, every little thing that you put in the ground is intention. I Often equate my burlesque and drag art to ceremony and that reclaiming of like indigenous bodies as the same as that reclaiming of indigenous land. And I'm wondering if you've come across this in your work or you've grappled with this in your work, like, how do you bring forward, or how do you grapple with your queer and indigenous identities together in the work that you do?

Matthew Hickey: 33:07

I mean, it's a struggle. We talk about indigenous placemaking in work a lot. And I really don't like this term. I like to think about place keeping. Our relations have been here way beyond even indigenous people. And how do we not make place for them, but keep place for these things to occur? You know, whether it's ceremony or being queer or, you know, having a place for butterflies to spawn, we have to really kind of start thinking about, um, what I like to call universal inclusivity, where we're thinking beyond, you know, just humans in urban environments and thinking about, you know, the rain that falls, you know, that's a gift to us and we tend to treat it like it's stormwater management, right? So how do we keep place for, for all the things that are living in this world? And I think by doing that, we'll that larger move. We'll get into a point where we can make space for everyone. So everybody feels accepted and comfortable in spaces. I think we've kind of stripped the cities specifically the downtown core from that life. And we need to start bringing, bringing it back or keeping place for it.

Midnight Wolverine: 34:21

I was reflecting back to when I was walking down in Yonge and Dundas square, I didn't see a single tree for like a block. So like what would it take to get that green space in downtown?

Matthew Hickey: 34:34

At one point in time, it was all green space, you know, and we forget that. And we started talking about, you know, indigenous placemaking. We know we need to take some things back now, how do we create more park space? How do we create more green space? Whether it's on the ground plane, the, where the car is and bikes are going and pedestrians go, or do we lift that up into the sky? Do we mandate ideas about having green roofs that are accessible to people and not only people, you know, birds, insects, bees, all the things that are struggling right now beyond, beyond us, that's the way that I would approach it. And then with new developments, we really need to think about how we're touching the ground. Is there possibilities for us to reduce the amount of floor space in like in a lobby? So you'd go up first and then create more ground plane for us to actually be on the ground. One of the things that we did at Anishnabe health is that underneath it is there's no parking garage underneath it. So when you're doing ceremony in this space, on the ground floor, you're actually touching the ground. So there's a really beautiful connection. That's undeniable. I think we need that there to be able to put our feet in the grass or feet on the soil.

Midnight Wolverine: 35:43

I haven't even like, thought about that, that idea that if we looked underneath the ground as well, it would just be like parkades and parkades and parkades Yeah.

Matthew Hickey: 35:52

Well, and even at Yonge and Dundas square, right. It's a parkade right there. No wonder it feels so hollow.

Midnight Wolverine: 35:57

Yeah. Because there's no sense of, of like connection there. What would queerness look like in the form of architecture?

Matthew Hickey: 36:06

I mean, I think it would be more universal. I think there would be an openness to the way, not, maybe not even just the built form, but the process. So it might be embedded more in that process of the design and consultation and working with people. I mean, there's some things that are really difficult to bend, for example, a door it's a rectangular piece of equipment that comes in standardized sizes, but what if you wanted a round door, you know, what, if you wanted to door that did something else, it's not that easy to do that anymore. And that's something so simple as just the door. Right. So I would imagine that queer identity in an architectural form would also have those, those kinds of standardizations with normalicy, which wouldn't work for us.

Midnight Wolverine: 36:52

Has there been a project in your lifetime that you've worked on where you felt like you could bring your whole self to it and what would be your dream? Yeah. What would be your like architectural dream?

Matthew Hickey: 37:04

We're doing a project in Toronto right now? Uh, with, Anishnabe Health and Miziwe Biik, and it's at Block 10 in the Canary district, and it's really an meant to be an indigenous hub. It's one of the first times where a block is being developed specifically from an indigenous point of view indigenous health, uh, which is really important, also training and education employment center there as well. And then housing. This is a developer driven project and it's a little different because there's always that kind of question of money. It comes down to the proforma. So while the idea is there, I don't think that it's completely hitting a hundred percent of what I would think is the best work that we can do now saying that we are working on another similar project in Hamilton, which is the same kind of idea, housing coming together, healthcare coming together, childcare coming together on a site that is being driven by the indigenous service providers. So it's a complete kind of different shift in thinking about, you know, what's going to make us the most money, but what is going to be the best for our people. And one of the things that we're doing on that site is it's, it had an urban agriculture component to it. And what we're trying to do is not only integrate that into the buildings, but create more space for urban agriculture on the site, whether it be on the roof or the design of the buildings, and then using the buildings and the microclimates that they create in order to be able to plant food that will sustain the people actually on site. So it's kind of this 360 approach where we're looking at thing and everyone on the site, you know, collecting rain, water, harvesting from the land, making sure that people are connected with the land. I think we've lost that tactility where we have our hands in the dirts and touching things, you know what you're so amazing. So that project for me is, is really, really the one that's kind of lifting me up right now. But yeah, it's really great because it's all the service providers coming together. We have, they do our designee with WASA, Ontario Aboriginal housing services. So it's all these different indigenous service providers that we've worked with individually and now coming together as a group, uh, it's called[inaudible], uh, which means welcome in Anishnabe.

Midnight Wolverine: 39:12

That's a beautiful, that's like such a great example of that like holistic perspective that is so central to most like indigenous cultures. So how do we bring, like you said that like childcare and access to health and access to ceremony and access to community together in one space that would, that sounds ideal.

Matthew Hickey: 39:31

We talk about a lot of things too, like, uh, having multi-generational households, you know, I think this is something that is very common in indigenous households, but it's not in mainstream society and we're losing things like how our children used to be taught by our elders and they would spend time together. Now it's like the grandparents live in one house and the kids live in another house. So being able to bring these different generations together and then adding in, you know, place for ceremony, all these things is going to be beneficial to, to the larger community as well. We get asked a lot about what indigenous architecture is and what we're seeing is kind of the shift from mainstream, thinking back towards indigenous ways of knowing and being, you know, we're seeing it with sustainability, we're seeing it with the restorative design. We're seeing it with regenerative design, having more respect for the gifts that we're getting from mother earth. And we're not seeing it going the other way. We're not seeing indigenous people trying to be mainstream. We're using their materials or modern materials, but we're thinking about it in a manner that's more indigenous. So that shift, I think, is allowing people to start to recognize the faults that we've made. And I mean, architecture is progress and it's actually representation of the society that we live in at any point in time. And I think that we're moving towards an awareness that, you know, living in a city is not healthy. Our innate connection with nature is very important for not only our physical health, but our mental health.

Midnight Wolverine: 40:59

I had this random thought as you were talking about like the just holistic spaces and the projects you're working on. And I thought of like, Toronto has these pockets of communities like Greektown and little Italy and Chinatown. And I'm like, what would it look like to have like a Mohawk block or something like that? Do you think that's possible? Why do you think that like doesn't exist in Toronto? And like, what have you seen to be the most common barriers to creating these pockets of community in Toronto?

Matthew Hickey: 41:30

Being in post-truth and reconciliation, I mean it's five old now and it's still slowly like chugging along. People are starting to recognize the value that indigenous people bring to our country. So a lot of people don't know they haven't been educated. I wasn't educated about anything indigenous in the public school. You know, it didn't happen. I learned in French class through savages. So it's taken me a long time to really understand the complexities of the Indian act, the complexities of residential schools. But it's also through that journey. I've started to learn, you know, Hey, we had very powerful knowledge about how we do things, how we approach things. Mainstream society is starting to recognize that these things are valuable and can be beneficial in a selfish way from a proforma point of view. If you can make your buildings better, make your spaces better, people are going to pay more for them to live in them. So there's that aspect, right? It's always comes down to cash, which is kind of terrible, but we're pushing as much as we can do that from an urban realm point of view, to try and make people feel the place that they're in. This is something that developers, I don't think, think about very much. They think about their proforma, what do I have to do? What does the zoning require me to do? And it's really rare that you find developers thinking about indigeneity or understanding the benefits of approaching projects in a different way, or thinking about consultation in a different way. Now, I will say this, we are working with a few that are starting to get it. You know, they see the value in bringing us on board. It's just a mindset shift. And we as architects and developers are trained in the same way, you know, you've gone to a colonial school and you're taught in colonial methods and that's continues on until somebody comes to break that way of thinking. I mean, if we're not smudging at the beginning of a meeting, which I think is really important from a, from setting a mindset and openness point of view, which most people don't do, they just jump into their business, but to take a moment and to think about, you know, why we're doing a land acknowledgement. And I typically like to do a bit of teaching afterwards, whether it's teaching about the people that were here or something that's happening currently, just to add another layer of awareness. And I think it's through nobody's fault really, but there's a lack of education around, around indigenous people in Canada and North America and all of the Americas, I should say, where we, we don't understand what was here and what has been lost. And the moment you start educating people about that is the moment they start to see the value and understand, Oh, Hey, you know, there's actually something here that could be, uh, could be useful in the way that I think about things or it could be useful in the way that I approach people. And so for me, it's really about kind of grounding people at the beginning and at the end of meetings, in a place of being open and listening and thinking about the words that you're saying before you say them, just to make sure that everyone's, you know, being conscious, we all have this energy that's going on. When you're in a room with people, you can feel that energy and it affects you, whether you like it or not. I've realized that it's a bridge and it's an unbuilt bridge. And I have responsibility on my side to, you know, reach out and to build my side of the bridge and people on the other side have their responsibility. And as long as I see them attempting to build that bridge, then I'm completely open and willing to build my side as well.

Midnight Wolverine: 45:00

You know, I come from a family of hunters. My, my dad and my brother would go out hunting every season and we would rarely ever buy store-bought meat because we were lucky enough to be able to eat from the land. But a part of that was we used every part of the animal. It was a really beautiful teaching around the first time that humans and animals came together, it was called the gathering space of beings. And so the first humans and all of the animals gathered together in the space, and there was an agreement made. The animals said that, you know, we we'll give up our lives so that you can survive and you can live. But in return, we ask that you honor us, we ask that you honor, where we come from, we ask that you honor the land and your relationship to this environment so that we can all continue surviving for years and years and generations to come. And this was an agreement made between the Dene people and the animals. You know, that's a part of our creation story. That's, that's rooted in the way that we do everything. And so if city building and, you know, relationships in general, were all approached from, you know, a Dene worldview, things would look very different, um, because the way that we interact with each other, talk to each other, you know, conflict resolution, thinking of, um, politics, social structures, all of that, so different. And so just the way that you were living in the present, you were thinking of the seven generations prior, you're ensuring that life will continue for all of those yet to come. And that's just a part of your present existence.

Matthew Hickey: 46:47

Can I ask you, how do you see, and this is beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. How can, how you see your performance fitting into kind of that, uh, that teaching, or do you see that having, you know, what you put out there in the world, what you create and how that has an effect on future generations or people that are here with you now?

Midnight Wolverine: 47:07

I do a lot of protest or performance, like political performance art, where a lot of my burlesque performances or drag performances have some sort of message within them, or they make you feel a certain way or think a certain way. And that's very intentional. And so I hope that through, you know, my poetry, my art, that people take away, whatever message it is that I'm trying to convey, whether it's, you know, connection or that, you know, we, as two spirit, people have always been here that we belong here. I do a fun drag act as Thomas from smoke signal. That's one of my favorites. Um, and the purpose of that act is just like indigiqueer joy. And it's always different performing that piece for a non-indigenous versus indigenous audience because non-indigenous folks don't get the reference. They think it's fun and, you know, you know, have a lot of fun watching it, but there just isn't the same connection as when it's indigenous folks watching this. Cause it's, you know, kind of a piece of indigenous pop culture and they're like, Oh, you know, we know smoke signals and you know, Thomas, and this is hilarious and here's you experiencing indigenous joy and just having fun. So, yeah, I mean, everything I do is in the hope that it's going to resonate or connect with someone else. And ideally that is another young queer indigenous person.

Matthew Hickey: 48:38

Yeah. I love what you said there with care and intention. And you can think about that with building too. You know, we have to think about how we're building spaces or urban realms with care and intention because it has an affect, you know, yours maybe with a group of people at one point in time or on the internet or wherever it is. But, you know, in a, in a built environment, people are experiencing it all the time. So there's really kind of a same kind of connection with thinking about the seventh generation or thinking about the teachings we have midnight. Maybe I could ask you if there's places in Toronto that you feel that you can be any of your identities where you can create and feel comfortable and are there, or maybe in the opposite of that, there are places where you don't feel comfortable.

Midnight Wolverine: 49:26

I think of some of the spaces that I perform in Glad day bookshop, buddies in bad times theatre there's like cherry Cola's rock and roll lounge. Um, there used to be the Beaver which no longer exists. And this has come up in visiting for example, glad day bookshop, where I performed quite a bit. And it feels like the only queer space in the gay village area, because when I go to Toronto's gay village, I don't feel like I belong. I think a lot of non binary folks, trans folks feel similarly, it doesn't feel like our space, our community, those spaces, where I do feel that sense of safety for creation for queerness is those pockets of land, like the Humber river. And so I would be so interested in like, how do we build more of these spaces into the fabric of Toronto where, you know, folks like myself can go and feel held and feel care and feel creative and feel this ability to, you know, create and do

Matthew Hickey: 50:31

Thinking about performance there. Are they inspiring you differently? These two different spaces because they're quite different, right? Yeah.

Midnight Wolverine: 50:38

Yes. I think when I go to the Humber, I'm accessing a solitude and reflection. And when I go to or perform at a show at say glad day, it's the energy community of people, uh, glitter, like sensory wise, um, inspiration and external expression. So I would say it's kind of like internal versus external.

Matthew Hickey: 51:05

That's fantastic. Cause you, I mean, you obviously do poetry, which is very much internalized and thinking and feeling and experiencing them. And then you're a word performance and glad days, like these are kind of like almost like breathing where you're like breathing in and then in those places you're breathing out and, and sharing with the world.

Midnight Wolverine: 51:24

Yeah. And I, I definitely need both of that. I need both of that in my life that like breathing in and breathing out burlesque and drag has given me this space, this opportunity to wear glitter beards and try on different clothes and feel my body and move my body and like reclaim space and reclaim my body and express myself in the way that I want to be seen. Yeah.

Matthew Hickey: 51:49

And the way you want to feel, right. The way you want to feel as a person internally.

Midnight Wolverine: 51:54

Yeah. Absolutely. Queer folks have always carved out or found these kinds of underground spaces to be themselves. And if we think about what would it mean to have queer communities feel comfortable existing in the open? Does it take a changed mindset or does it take open spaces for folks to go to, to feel like they can be themselves?

Matthew Hickey: 52:16

I think what church street did or is still doing to some degree is creates that diversity. It's a pressure cooker. It's a condensed area where you hopefully see, I mean, it's probably not true for everybody, but you hopefully see some reflection of what you're feeling in the community that's there. And because it's one street, because it's really densely populated because a lot of people live around there. You have more of the ability to see diverse queer cultures, right? So there is something beneficial about having a place that's connected in that regards, but it's also a mindset. And I mean, people need to feel comfortable being who they are out in public without having other people bother them. And that, unfortunately that's not the way things are these days, even the church and Wellesley community is unsafe. You hear about people getting beat up all the time, you know, and it's, it's sad to hear that and to, to know that in 2021 that is still going on. But I think that we, uh, I mean, we're resilient and we're thinking about how we can do that. I mean, buddies in bad times is a great place for people to be artistic and express themselves and create. And I think that's really powerful because that gives you avenues to explore who you are in many ways. And then glad day is the same thing. You know, you have these little pockets here and there, but yeah, I think it would be great where there was a space that was specifically intended to support diverse queer culture. And so someone could know, you know, you come to Toronto, you could go there, you could see that you could explore who you are.

Midnight Wolverine: 53:52

Um, yeah, I believe so wholly in visibility and seeing yourself in other people, seeing yourself in spaces and the places that you exist in. So I would love to see, you know, designated billboards that are just there to showcase like the beauty of indigiqueer folks or indigiqueer community? One thing that I was talking about in the site visits what's every year, there is a, a ceremony on Valentine's day for missing and murdered indigenous women, girls, and two spirit and trans folks in the downtown core. I would love to see like a designated space where events like that can happen, um, where ceremonies like that can take place. So, you know, we're not having to stand on the steps of a building or, or in the middle of the street that we can have, you know, a designated space to do that. I would walk into the building and it would smell like Cedar, like Cedar wood.

Matthew Hickey: 54:52

Oh, this is something really important we don't think about is how a space smells. And this, I love going into any of the indigenous buildings here in Toronto, whatever it is, and there's this smell of Sage or Cedar. So you have that factory system activating, as soon as you walk in the door. And for me, you would, whether you're inside or outside the building, you would be constantly connected with nature visually, you know, you'd be able to feel the sun and you'd be able to see the trees. And I would love for it to be, you know, connected to the ground as well.

Midnight Wolverine: 55:22

I would love the ground to exist inside the space, little pockets of like earth or grass or Moss that you could touch and feel as you move inside of the space. So it almost feels like you're still outside, even though you are not.

Matthew Hickey: 55:38

Yeah. And maybe sometimes the walls could open so that you have other friends with you, the birds or insects flying through the space. So it's like, you're totally outside for portions of the year. Maybe not winter, but spring and fall would be amazing where you have the air flowing through the wind blowing through animals coming through.

Midnight Wolverine: 55:58

It would be more open concept. And rather than going directly up in an elevator or something, it would be like round circular ramps or staircases that you can kind of like wind your way through the space at a circular motion.

Matthew Hickey: 56:15

I love this ramps that take you on a path, you know, representing your journey, your, your movement through life, the, the time that it takes you to start healing, uh, entering and entering the building and leaving the building. You know, so you're not just, it's not utilitarian, right? It's you have that time to breathe. You have that time to think you have that time to calm your mind. Uh, moving through the spaces

Midnight Wolverine: 56:38

[inaudible], it'd be warm, like, like sunlight and bright and airy. And there would also be little pockets of, of like benches or chairs that are kind of pocketed together so that no matter where you are in the building or in the space, you could sit down, you know, with a cup of tea with a friend and not having to, you know, go outside and sit in the curb or try to find a place to just sit and be, um, that's just available no matter where you are in the building or in the space,

Matthew Hickey: 57:04

The little spaces like you said to stop and to think, and to talk and to learn and to listen little tea dispensers. That's great. I like this. It's like, it's, auntie's house seven little pockets of auntie's house, but you know, for the sound, when you're sitting in these areas, it's very calming. You're not hearing echoes of sirens, but a very calming kind of muted sound when you're sitting with your, with your elders or sitting by yourself. Yeah.

Midnight Wolverine: 57:31

That soundproof from all of the external noise, or maybe there's like a, an ambient nature sounds that are feeling the space as you're in it just kind of like softly in the background. Um, and there would be softness like soft spaces. So rather than sitting on, on hard concrete or hard brick or hard wood it's lined with, with cushions, um, and, uh, and just makes you feel a sense of comfort. And homeliness like you said, like you're at auntie's house. Yeah.

Matthew Hickey: 57:59

Wrapped wrap the corners disappear. They become curves that the difference between the floor and the wall becomes a curve. So you feel like you're wrapped with a big hug or a warm blanket, also helping with the acoustics. And yeah, I think vibrant or rich colors would help as well, really warm dual like colors, earth tones, and beautiful lighting. You know, whether it's natural lighting promotes of the space, but also lighting that kind of disappears. So the space is really just a nice warm, ambient glow,

Midnight Wolverine: 58:31

And artwork, um, whether it's, you know, weavings or paintings or carving where anything, you know, that is symbolic or representative of the people who want to be in that space, you know, that's also supporting local artists, local communities so that they can see themselves in their work exist, um, in a space like this.

Matthew Hickey: 58:55

Yeah. I love that. The idea of craft, you know, whether it's in, through art or even the way that the building is put together, being expressed, showing, uh, the intention of the people that built the building and even thinking about some of the materials that are being used, natural materials, starting to reflect the natural environment, uh, used in ways that are really reflective of our contemporary society.

Midnight Wolverine: 59:17

Yeah. What's coming is just this idea that it's not stagnant, but there's a movement and form and shape, and, you know, it's changing and it transforms every time you go into it, um, or every month something's different and, you know, generations from now, the space is ever evolving in a way that makes sense for the folks who are coming in and out of it. So I would say something to do with this idea of continuous it, or like reciprocity or like the circular newness, um, like the cyclical nature of our, of our world in a building. Yep.

Ambient Sound: 1:00:12

[inaudible]

Midnight Wolverine: 1:00:12

Tkaronto, you know, originally was the gathering place of different nations. Like that was what Toronto was. That was what the Humber river was. It was those surrounding nations would come and gather in this area because it was so bountiful and fertile and they would trade and, you know, you know, probably sometimes not get along, but ultimately trade and co-exist in the space and had this reciprocal relationship of give and take from the land. And Toronto still is, you know, that gathering place, like it's, it's a hub for a lot of like immigrant folks and folks coming from rural areas and other countries and coming to the city. So it still is this gathering place, but what's lost is that connection to the like beautiful, fertile bountiful area that existed. It was like, it continued to be this gathering space, but we lost that relationship to the land. And so I would love to see Toronto continue to be that like beautiful gathering space of different nations and people and identities, but with acknowledgement and in honoring the ground and place and land, you know, this idea or concept that what we create is going to be here forever. How do we ensure that as we are walking forward in this life journey, that we are constantly thinking of the ones that are coming behind us.

Hima Batavia: 1:01:53

Thank you for listening. If this episode sparks something in you consider sharing it with a fellow Torontonian, we are all imagining possible futures for Toronto into being, find us on Instagram at Luminato festival and watch out for episode two, launching next month. Desire paths is produced by Alex Rand and co curated by Alex Rand and myself, Hima Batavia with creative producers, Macy Siu, Jeremy Glenn, and Robert Bolton of Toronto based foresight studio From Later. Thank you to glad day bookshop in supporting the recording of this episode.